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The Citadel was the hub of the galaxy, a place unalike to any other, incomparable in its design and purpose. More so for its population. There were always people rotating throughout the extensive station. Never a place to lack for sights, both in its immense structures and features, as well as for all that went on between residents, guests and workers, those there on business or pleasure. It was truly the centre of the galaxy in every conceivable regard. A place to capture the mind and inspire the sense of unity upon which it stood, truly unique.
To young Ranni T’Karia, it was special for a different reason entirely.
“Daddy!”
The little asari ripped her hand from her mother’s loose grip, running across the presidium to greet her other parent as she emerged from the lift that stretched up the citadel tower.
Marika T’Karia, in all her regal attire and a mere moment removed from her demanding position as Asari Councilor, softened to see her daughter. Her markings quirked as she tried, for a single moment, to keep herself composed. It was to no avail. A smile broke her stoic face, her shoulders fell loosely, a breath passed her gold-painted lips, and she held her arms wide to the girl.
In a whirl of Marika’s biotics, Ranni was lifted from the ground as she leapt off from one foot, all but soaring the short distance. Like a blue star, glittering with laughter as she came falling into Marika’s arms. The biotic energy which remained around her Marika swirled with one finger an inch from Ranni’s face, getting her to stare in mystified wonder. A small hand grabbed for it, looking up at Marika with shock when beneath her hand the energy disappeared like smoke.
The hand, still held up, touched Marika’s cheek. Her intent was known, and Marika dipped her head and closed her eyes. Without a word, not even a breath, she whispered for her to show her all she had missed.
As both their eyes shimmered into the stark obsidian of a meld, Marika found her mind flooded with feeling, colour and light. The lapping of waves against little feet that had never before felt water so fresh and so cold, the bustling sound of streets deafened beneath a mother’s humming, a lecture filled with words that the young mind could process as little more than babbling, drawings done in brilliant shades of red and blue and purple that were too much to pack. A dozen kisses goodnight, the sound of her own voice and a flickering blue hologram, overwhelming feelings of a child’s joy.
In return, Marika showed her the view from the council chambers, the endless lights and sounds of the wards, and the feeling of happiness which had grasped her heart to see her but a moment before.
Ranni’s giggling broke through the black haze of the meld. No need for words between them as the girl clutched the strap of her mother’s dress and languished in being in her arms again. Only a whisper from Marika, that she had missed her, and a kiss to the top of her fair blue crests.
It was then that Marika lifted her eyes, knowing the sight which would greet her, yet finding still a sigh passing her lips as she for a single moment contemplated running through the presidium as her daughter had. Foolish, yet she considered it to see her, all three hundred years of her life seeming to fade from her, a maiden before the woman she loved.
“Rennala,” Marika called, sounding the lovestruck fool she felt.
“Our sweeting got ahead of me, it seems,” murmured the taller woman, voice high but quiet. She approached Marika with a smile that to all but her was imperceptible.
“Excitable,” Marika offered as explanation. The girl in her arms nodded.
“She gets that from you.”
“And the not talking, preferring the meld,” Marika began in that tone of teasing, “that’s all you.”
“Hush.” Rennala’s cheeks held a lilac blush.
“That can be for later,” Marika seemed to promise, fingers stroking down the back of Ranni’s crests as she gave Rennala a devious smile. She whispered in a tone too suggestive for their daughter to pick up, “I have missed your mind.”
“And I yours,” Rennala whispered back, near rapturous.
Before Marika could so playfully tease her for how plainly she came undone, Ranni was reaching to hold the back of one of Marika’s crests. A quiet plea for attention, as if her father had in those brief moments forgotten her existence. She would remind her, tugging with a silent need.
Turning her attention to her, Marika asked, “Would you like to walk the presidium?”
“Yes!”
“Can you walk or must I carry you?” Marika asked in mock exhaustion, back bending as if Ranni weighed twice what she did. It got her daughter to laugh, slipping from her arms to stand in front of her.
Standing upright, Marika gave a sigh of fake relief, earning her an affectionate smile from Rennala as she asked, “Such a burden to carry her?”
“She needs to walk sometimes, lest her little legs fuse and form a fish’s tail,” Marika teased. It was a common threat, made whenever Ranni whined to be put down, spun of their ancient aquatic ancestry and just enough truth a child did believe it.
Ranni whined and buried her face against Marika’s thigh. Her hand found Marika’s, holding tight to it, saying in that voice untrained, “Not a fish.”
“Not yet, but if mummy keeps spoiling you as she does, carrying you and doting on you-”
“Oh, you are little but mischief,” Rennala sighed. She was still smiling, reaching down to take Ranni’s other hand.
“Mischief,” Ranni repeated as they began their walk through the presidium. Between her parents, a hand held by each, she swung her arms and began to look around the large and open area.
It was unusual, to get to walk around the presidium. Usually they would meet Marika for dinner and go back to her apartment, walk around the wards, go shopping, spend time together as a family, before she and Rennala returned to Thessia. The presidium was beautiful in a way the rest of the Citadel was not, and Ranni tugged to go faster, to see more, leading them with a pull at their hands.
Marika and Rennala exchanged a look over her, a private look of affection, for each other and her, before wordlessly agreeing to follow where she led.
“She claims to not be a fish, yet to water she runs.”
Leaning over the glass barrier, Ranni let go of her parents’ hands, as if to hoist herself over and towards the large water feature in the middle of the presidium. Marika’s hand on her back kept her from managing, and she looked up at her with watery gold eyes. Understanding, a warmth spreading from her shoulder, and she accepted with a little puff of air from her lips as she settled back onto her feet.
Rennala shook her head. “She is so much like you.”
“Yet she takes to academia as you, a scholar in the making,” Marika remarked.
It was ignored, Rennala preferring not to speak on such things. As if to distract from it, she continued, “You swam in there once.”
“And, if I recall correctly, you joined me,” Marika recalled with a smug touch to her voice. She leaned across, whispering at the soft joining of crest to neck, “In the nude, if memory serves.”
“It was not the same as our moonlit amours in the sea, but it was certainly memorable.”
“Perhaps not all of her mischief comes from me.”
Another shared look, and Marika could not hold in her laughter. Rennala managed a more modest smile, though it pulled at her eyes and set her gaze out to the water. If she looked too long at her bondmate, she would surely break and join her in her laughter. Their daughter joined her, not knowing what they were laughing at but wanting to feel included.
In her laughter, she was picked up and placed on the edge of the barrier so she could see out to the other side of the water. She could spot hanar and a drell, colourful races which she fixed her eyes upon with interest, while her parents stood behind her.
Knowing it had to be asked, Marika slid an arm around Rennala’s waist and brought her close. She wanted her near when she breathed, “How long?”
“Only two days.”
Marika closed her eyes. “Ren, I-”
“I know.” Rennala nestled against her, head on hers, splits in Marika’s crests accepting hers in like interlocking pieces. She kept a hand on Ranni’s stomach, holding her near as she whispered, “May I give the good news?”
“Good news?” Marika seemed to laugh in disbelief.
Head turning, Rennala kissed at Marika’s markings, across her crests as she spoke against them, “I have found someone to take over my classes next semester, permanently.”
“Don’t tease me,” Marika begged, in a tone familiar, yet laced with pain in place of need.
“She’s lovely, I taught her a few decades ago, she’s eager and qualified, and I have obligations elsewhere.”
“Your career-”
“Comes second to our family,” Rennala assured her. The hand on Ranni’s stomach rubbed lightly in circles. She kissed Marika’s head again, promising, “This is my desire.”
“I should be the one to come to you, back to Serrice, I could go back to teaching,” Marika insisted. It was only to beg for assurance, to be told it was an absurd offer, and in her bondmate’s hold she found it true.
“You hold the highest seat of power in the galaxy, could you really go back to teaching religion studies and history? Councilor Marika, stuck in a lecture hall discussing Athame and the rise of pantheism, what a dreadful thought.”
“Stop it, stop making sense.” Marika was squirming, resembling Ranni perhaps more than she ever had in that moment. A fretful girl, not yet cresting maidenhood.
Rennala kissed her face, telling her simply, “The semester ends a month today, I have already promised Sellen my office, now collect yourself, before you begin to weep as a babe as you look like you may.”
“It is hardly fair of you,” Marika sighed as she gathered herself and stood straighter, a possessive hand on Ranni’s head, “to be so clever and so infuriatingly wonderful.”
“Perfectly fair, I believe,” Rennala countered easily. She could see how tears welled still in Marika’s eyes, to be left unshed for two days. Leaning down, Rennala whispered against Ranni’s head, “I told her, sweeting.”
The little head whipped back, looking up at Marika with barely contained delight. She grinned with all her teeth, head bonking Marika’s hand as she said, “Coming to stay with daddy.”
“You are, and you hid it from me so well,” Marika commended in that desperately sweet voice she saved just for her.
“Tricked,” Ranni agreed with her, smiling as wide as she ever had.
“Oh, tricked indeed, by my clever little fish.” Marika sucked her lips in, moving them like a fish’s mouth, in and out to great comedic effect.
Ranni’s laughter lit up the entire presidium. She clung to Marika, feet wiggling and face buried against the bare expanse of scales around her clavicle. She had pushed herself back into Marika’s arms, and Marika held her quickly, firmly, to make sure she did not fall to the ground. She shook her head, their forecrests rubbing and noses brushing, while still she made the little mouth. A tiny hand grabbed it and held her lips.
Rennala had to gently intervene, withholding laughter as she pried the hand from Marika’s lips. Only with a kiss did she stop her silly act, lips melting into a self-satisfied grin as Rennala kissed her and slid Ranni into her own arms.
Touching foreheads with her daughter, Rennala said, “I can hardly imagine the mischief you’re going to get up to once daddy can teach you all her tricks.”
“We can start today, if our sweeting is up for it, as a spectre is scheduled to come by the council chambers this afternoon.”
“I should just as soon take her to Omega to watch bloody fights to the death.”
“I am hardly so brutal as you remember,” Marika murmured, demurring coyly.
“You made the last turian Primarch throw up with a single look and four words.”
“That was a hundred years ago, I was still a maiden trying to prove to the galaxy my own right to existence,” Marika dismissed with a wave of her hand. Grand and calculated, a flourish as she smiled and went on, more earnestly, “I have softened considerably since.”
“And then what tricks is it you intend to teach Ranni?” Rennala asked, lightly bouncing the girl in her arms as they made their way towards one of the long bridges over the water.
“Negotiation and patience, of course.”
“Of course,” Rennala said with an affectionate disbelief.
“And, if the spectre should prove troublesome-”
“Marika,” warned Rennala.
“How to graciously handle those who do not respect you,” Marika finished, as quick with her words as she had ever been. The biting tone went over Ranni’s head, but Rennala gave her a look.
“We will attend and watch, perhaps it will keep you on your best behaviour.”
Stopping in the middle of the bridge to turn and face both her bondmate and daughter, Marika beamed with all the light of the galaxy. Radiant, she stared and let her eyes blink slowly as she regarded them, as if by her will all time stood still so she might take in each detail. She said, face split in a grin and voice breathless, “Brilliant.”
Rennala might have stared and stood back until the presidium lights dimmed and dipped them into false night, were it not for the girl in her arms asking in a curious voice, “Go?”
“Not yet, we still have time before I’m expected back,” Marika explained, slipping her hand onto Ranni’s back as the other found Rennala’s own hand, fingers threading together. She looked to Rennala, asking, “Is there anything you wanted to do?”
“No,” Rennala found herself answering too quickly. She was still only staring.
“No?”
“No,” Rennala repeated. She was smiling, a soft sound, almost like a laugh, escaping her quirked lips. She said, “I only wanted to see you, I only ever want to see you.”
“Soon you’ll see so much of me you’ll be sick of me,” Marika teased her, and though it was a joke Rennala shook her head.
“Never,” she promised.
She meant it, lifting Marika’s hand to her lips, over Ranni’s head, kissing it, before moving so she could get at her palm, where her scales were small and soft. She kissed again, wishing they were somewhere private, where their minds could flood each other and they could tangle into a singular united being. She wanted to feel her move, she wanted to be her body to control and feel through, she wanted to be but one creature, bound and eternal, as their vows had promised.
Then, she could only kiss her hand and through that shallow joining tell her as much. In the fluttering of fingers to her face, she was told it would come later, once their young one was asleep and they had her apartment to themselves.
Pulling up, to stop herself drowning in what meld they did share, she looked at Marika and said, “You could show us your office. It has a wonderful view.”
“That it does,” Marika agreed, sensing the need for a change in topic. “Would you like that, Ranni?”
“Yes,” Ranni agreed in that firm little voice. She was discerning, aware that something had happened, that much was clear in how she looked at Marika, but too young to voice such strangeness. Young, and easily distracted.
“I can show you the aquarium I keep,” Marika said, getting an eager nod from the girl. She sucked her lips in to tease her once more, stopping when she saw Rennala giving her a look.
“Fishies,” said Ranni happily.
Marika and Rennala caught each other staring over Ranni’s head, Rennala going a warm violet while Marika only smirked and winked at her. She reached in and took Ranni from her arms, setting her down. Without complaint, Ranni reached both hands up, and each was taken by one of them.
Swinging her between them, they made their way across the rest of the bridge, sharing a private glance and knowing without a meld that they were both thinking the same thing; one day soon, that route would be a familiar one, walked as a family daily.
Had any doubts remained, that alone would have convinced Rennala that she had made the right decision. None did, however, all dispelled by the sound of Ranni’s laughter as Marika joked about tossing her in the aquarium, and the sight of Marika, smiling without lingering sadness for knowing one day soon, there would be no more goodbyes.